One needs to recall another country, this one in SE Asia, which was brought to this point after a long war with great sacrifice. It was all thrown away when one political party relentlessly worked and succeeded in cutting off the primarily logistical support promised and needed.

Not to worry…the combat brigades in Iraq and being deployed to Iraq are just under a new name now. They will still be there to enforce the peace and back up the Iraqi forces as they “train” and “advise” the Iraqi military. They are also an able deterent to Iran’s ambitions.

#1 It’s a problem in a democracy, when the people don’t want to fight an expensive war, one with little payoff.

Some say four million vietnamese people died; we successfully decimated their economy for a generation (showing, perhaps, that when you destroy a country’s land, socialism won’t work). Compared to them, we did quite well. Granted, the psychological devastation of decimating 27% of the Cambodian population may have led to Pol Pot, but at the very least we could taught them how dangerous communists were.